


Might Haves, Maybes, and Never Weres

by bigasswritingmagnet (thekumquat)



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Death, Character Undeath
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-09
Updated: 2019-05-09
Packaged: 2020-02-29 05:27:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18772126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thekumquat/pseuds/bigasswritingmagnet
Summary: A collection of canon-divergent AU ficlets taking place in Thedas, to varying degrees of 'divergent'. (Some of these have already been posted on tumblr)1. Consider Krem - What should, but doesn't, happen if you don't do Bull's personal quest before Trespasser.2. Warden Hawke - If the Hero of Fereldan dies, but a Hawke twin doesn't, someone has to fill the role.3. Where's Varric? - Heroic sacrifices are not exclusively for protagonists.





	1. Consider Krem

If you don’t do  _Demands of the Qun_ , the Chargers live, but Bull remains loyal to the qun. If you leave him behind, he’ll arrive through a side door to fight you on Viddasala’s orders anyway.  

Consider Krem.  

Consider Krem, who sits in a chair on Bull’s bad side, to be his eyes, so the chief can relax when he’s off-duty. Consider Krem, who trusts Bull with his life, but knows he can get up to some truly hair-brained shenanigans when left on his own, and watches  _him_ as often as he watches the room.  

Consider Krem seeing Bull slip out of the tavern, silently, without a word to anyone, with his jaw set and his eye sharp. Consider Krem feeling unease in the pit of his stomach, an unshakable feeling that something is up. Consider Krem following, quietly. 

Bull is good at what he does, but he’s focused on his mission and he’s taught Krem well. Consider the Iron Bull and his shadow passing unseen, both driven by a duty and loyalty of very different kinds. 

The Iron Bull arrives to join the fight, on the wrong side, on the right side, to prove himself a traitor and a loyal soldier. 

Krem knows Iron Bull is a qunari, knows he is Ben Hassrath, but it’s one thing to know a fact and another thing to  _know_. The Iron Bull does not  _act_ like a qunari. He sings dirty songs and he drinks and he laughs too loud and he fucks like it’s going out of style. 

Consider Krem, for the first time, seeing  _Hissrad._

_Nothing personal, bas._

In this version of the story, Iron Bull’s loyalty was never tested. He never had to make a sacrifice, one way or the other. This is the story where Iron Bull could have it both ways, where he could continue his knife-edge dance between Tal Vashoth and Qunari. 

But in being both, he is also  _neither_ , and when Krem charges in and places himself between Hissrad and the Inquisitor, there is no certainty for the Iron Bull to lean on. The qunari sees an obstacle to be dealt with, but the tal vashoth sees  _Krem._

“What are you  _doing_ , Chief?" 

Do the words come?  _I am doing my duty. Anaan esaam qun._  Or do they stick in his throat, hot and raw, because without certainty, the orders made his head swim and his stomach tie into knots, made the faces of the men and women he’s fought beside flicker like nightmares in his mind. The qun has been so far and so distant for so long. To have it this close again, is it a comfort? Or a cage? Does he know the difference? 

"Get out of the way, Krem." 

” _No.“_

Krem is loyal to the Iron Bull first and foremost, but in this world, the tal vashoth world, loyalty is not blind obedience. It’s Krem’s  _job_  to push back, to question schemes, to be the voice of something like reason. 

"Don’t do this, Chief. This isn’t you." 

But it is. But it isn’t.   
  
An order was given. One that Hissrad is compelled to obey. One that the Iron Bull is  _incapable_  of obeying. 

"You have to go through me first,” Krem says, angry, determined, defiant, unflinching.   
  
Consider Krem, loyal beyond death, who found a friend and a purpose and a  _home_ with the Iron Bull. Whose last thoughts, in another story, were of certainty and trust.  _He’ll come. He’ll call. He won’t leave us. Horns pointing up._ In every story where he stands between Hissrad and Iron Bull, he is not afraid.   

There is no version of this story where he dies. When the ax falls, it is from numb fingers, and it rings bloodless against the stones at their feet. 

As long as Krem draws breath, Hissrad will always become Iron Bull. 


	2. Warden Hawke

Imagine Carver or Bethany doesn’t die, but everyone thinks they did. They wake up alone and badly injured. They are surrounded by charred darkspawn, and Wesley, blighted and dead. Would it be too far off for them to assume everyone else was dragged off by Darkspawn? 

They can’t go back to Lothering. They have no idea how to go forward, or where to go. We know the twins are very susceptible to the blight, so they are wandering, alone, hurt, waiting for whatever death might come, be it bleeding out or becoming a ghoul or torn apart by darkspawn. 

And this is the timeline where the Hero of Fereldan didn’t survive the joining, and it’s just Morrigan and Alistair. And Alistair is a kind soul with a good heart and maybe he has enough arch demon blood left in his supplies that he can muster up a quick-and-dirty joining.   
  
So the world rights itself. Now there are two Wardens again, and we all know Alistair prefers to follow. So Warden Hawke does what Hawkes do: they step up. They shoulder the burden. They do what needs to be done. When they hear about the truth behind the fall of Ostagar and the death of the king…

Carver wants justice for the comrades he fought beside, for his lost family, for Lothering. But Bethany? Bethany is Sunshine sweet, all soft smiles and gentle laughter and kindness. Surely she could never have the kind of drive it takes to lead a revolution, to decide the fate of kingdoms.  

But if you’ve ever taken her to the deep roads and made her a warden, you know that there is  _anger_ in her, a deep and bitter wellspring waiting to be tapped. Warden Bethany Hawke is a woman who will destroy Loghain Mac Tir with her own hands.

[Despite the very bad decision we can all admit it is, they let Zevran stay. It might be because he is useful and skilled and clever. It might be because he reminds them of a lost sibling who always had a quick joke and a clever smile on hand when trouble came to call.]

The story unfolds, slightly different but the outline stays the same, and the archdemon is slain and the blight is ended, and Warden Hawke is the Hero of Ferelden. 

Nobody ever seems to refer to the Hero of Ferelden by name. Maybe the name never quite reaches Hawke’s ears. Or there are just so many rumors, who knows which ones are true?  Hawke becomes Champion, but Kirkwall is so far away, and by then, Warden Commander Hawke has stepped down and taken up a quest of the utmost importance. 

Then the chantry explodes, the rebellion begins, and the world turns its eyes to Kirkwall. To the Champion. And oh, when Leliana hears the Champion’s name, hears that at least one member of her dear friend’s family still draws breath…

Warden Hawke cannot lead the Inquisition. They have their own mission to attend to. Cassandra can’t know that they’re there. (And let’s face it, Cassandra is kind of the worst at interrogation; Leliana suspects she’s not going to get Hawke’s location.) 

See things from Varric’s point of view, briefly. The Seeker has left, and he’s alone in a far-too-big and far-too-empty mansion, surrounded by ghosts. He’s lost in thought when he hears the door open again, and he thinks with a tired sigh,  _here we go again_. 

But it’s not the Seeker who appears in the doorway, ready to throw something at him again. It’s a Grey Warden, aged beyond their years, ancient eyes in a face that hasn’t even reached thirty. 

A face that looks…familiar. 

“I’m guessing you have questions too."  

"Yes,” says the Warden, drawing up a chair and sitting down. They look exhausted, and their clothes are still thick with the dust of travel. He can smell them from several feet away. 

“You should talk to the Seeker. She already asked me lots of questions." 

"I would, but I think you’re going to give me very different answers." 

Varric raises an eyebrow to hide his growing nervousness. Cassandra hadn’t given him more than superficial bruising, but Grey Wardens…they could be ruthless in their pursuit. What would the Wardens want from Hawke? Unless they wanted Anders…

"And why’s that?" 

"Because I’m going to ask in a different way.” The warden leans forward, and meets his eyes with an intensity that makes Varric shrink back. “I am the Hero of Ferelden. I am Warden Hawke. Where is my family?” 


	3. Where's Varric?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Heroic sacrifices are not exclusively for protagonists.

Varric hung back, keeping up a steady stream of arrows until he saw Hawke vanish through the rift at the top of the stairs. He relaxed, just a little. She made it out. She was safe. He hadn't gotten her killed. 

But it wasn't that easy. It couldn't be that easy. It never was. 

Before he and Alistair and Lavellan could make it to the stairs leading up to the rift, the Nightmare was moving towards them, its mountainous bulk rapidly lodging between them and the way out. 

"Shit," he muttered. Then, "Go." 

"What?" 

"The Inquisition needs a leader, and so do the Wardens. You..." He swallowed, throat suddenly dry as the implications of what he was saying hit him. Shit. Death by heroic sacrifice. He'd turned into one of his own characters. "You go. I'll keep it distracted. I'm good at that," he added with a grin he didn't quite feel. 

"Varric, no. You  _ can't _ ." Lavellan's eyes were overbright. She'd wanted badly to be his friend, he thought. He knew she was remembering what he'd said, about how she was so much more than a person to him, to everyone. Disciples die to save their leaders, she was thinking. Friends don't.

Joke was on her. 

He would. 

He was. 

Just not for her. 

"This is the Warden's mistake," Alistair said. "I need to fix it." 

"No," Varric said. "This was  _ my  _ mistake. Corypheus, the red lyrium, it's all on me. I need to make this right."

A hero's death by redemption or the faithful sidekick giving it all to save the hero? He should decide quick. He wouldn't have much time.  

" _ Varric _ ," Lavellan said again, but he knew he'd won the argument. He gave her a smile, stronger than he felt.  

"Say goodbye to Hawke for me, would you?"  

Varric stepped back, and Lavellan and Alistair cleared the way. He put Bianca's stock to his shoulder and punched three bolts into three twitching eyes. The Nightmare shrieked in pain and lumbered towards him. 

"Alright, Bianca," he said, gaze fixed on the demon even as he saw the others run through the rift in the corner of his eye. "Let's show them how it's done." 

  
  


"Where's Varric?" Hawke asked, glancing around. Even at his height, he wasn't easy to lose in a crowd, but the soldiers were clustering around their leader, eyes and mouths wide with awe.  

The Inquisitor's silence and averted gaze were her answer. It was not an answer she would accept. 

"Where's Varric?" she asked again, unable to keep the crack out of his name. The Inquisitor gathered herself up, and gave Hawke the distant, composed look of a proper leader. 

"Varric sacrificed himself to ensure that Alistair and I had time to escape," she said. Hawke didn't hear the rest of it. Couldn't hear it.  _ No. No. No. No.  _ The word echoed in time with the heartbeat pounding in her ears. An iron band wrapped around her chest, so tight she couldn't breathe. Someone put their hand on her shoulder. 

Hawke walked away. To where, she didn't know, so long as it wasn't here. Somewhere where she couldn't see the space he should have been. Blindly her feet walked the length of the battle-scarred keep, picking over dead bodies and around crumbled walls. Varric, gone. The thought was insane. It didn't seem real. It couldn't be real. 

Hawke leaned against a wall and stared out an arrow slit, over the endless sands. No more stories, no more jokes, no more letters. No more tilted grins and shining eyes. No more games of Wicked Grace, no more drinks at the Hanged Man, no more first drafts to tease about. Gone. Gone. Gone. 

 

News travels quickly. 

 

In the Davri estate, east of the Frostbacks, a dwarf stokes the fires of her forge. Her motions are as jerky and rote as a poorly-calibrated machine's. She pumps the bellows, feeds the smokeless coal to the flames until they roar, until the air around her bakes and shimmers. She drags a length of cherry red iron from the flames.  

Bianca’s works are usually more delicate than this. Gears rather than swords, more molds than forging, but her grief leaves her with no patience. She hammers the iron until the blade is so thin it would snap at a touch. Bianca hurls it into the water, where it spits and steams and falls to pieces. She grabs another iron brick from the flames. If her face is wet, it is surely from the heat. 

In a sanitorium outside of Kirkwall, a chantry sister sits beside a dwarf and speaks to him in a hushed and sympathetic tone. He shivers and twitches, eyes roving unceasingly over the room. It takes her several tries to get his attention, and a few more to understand her words. 

For two days Bartrand raves, screaming and howling and driving away anyone who comes near him. That is as long as he can hold a thought before the lyrium song drowns it out. Afterwards, he is as he always is -- irritable, unpleasant, singularly focused on a song no one else can hear. But there are days when the song ebbs, when he can hear himself over the whispers, and on those days, he weeps. 

At the Hanged Man, a crowd of silent men and women raise glasses. In Dark Town a woman tucks away a manuscript half-marked in red ink. In the alienage, Merrill rolls a ball of twine back and forth in her hands, tangling the rough string between her fingers as she tries to make sense of this new tragedy. In Hightown, Fenris runs a whetstone across the edge of his sword, and remembers old and better days spent with one of his first true friends. With her office door closed and her husband at her side, Aveline allows herself a few tears shed. Bethany curls up in the library of the Hawke estate, now so, so empty, and weeps. 

On the high seas, Isabela grits her teeth and turns her ship to open waters, and lets the salt spray cool her burning face. In the Anderfells, two beings that claim to be a man named Iver walk up the mountain path and sit in silence long into the night. 

In Skyhold, they hold a proper memorial. The right words are said, the right songs are sung. So many people attend that they spill out into the hallway. A stone and a small plaque are set up in the garden, a place to put flowers, for those who need to do such things. 

Hawke takes his rooms. She stays with the Inquisition until Corypheus is defeated. Until the work is done. 

She never goes to the gardens. 

  
  


She used to be called Champion, you know, but she won't let anyone call her that anymore. Some duke tried it and she threw him into the street! That's what I heard, anyway.  They say there was a statue on the docks once, but she tore it down. Or paid someone else to pull it down. I forget. 

They say she rents rooms in the Hanged Man but never uses them. Won't even set foot in the tavern. But she doesn't let anyone in -- keeps them locked up tight, year round. They say if you ask the bartender, he'll deny the whole thing, and if you keep asking, he throws you out. 

You know that chain around her neck? I heard there's a ring on it, a signet ring from one of the Merchant Guild families. I heard the family tried to take it back and she pulled out a bow and shot them. Or shot at them. 

There's so many stories about her, and they say if you ask her, she always says they're true. Even the ones that can't be true. Even the one about the dragon.  _ Especially  _ the one about the dragon. 

She's an odd woman, is the Viscountess.   


End file.
